... As you say, this doesn't translate into great utility as a military weapon. But consider for a moment who the likely users of scythe-cum-polearms were during the Middle Ages -- peasant levies who were conscripted into feudal armies as ad hoc auxiliaries. They were in large part not equipped by their masters and had to provide whatever they could use in battle... the men served on a short-term basis (they had to get back to the farm eventually to feed their families) and their survival rate in battle was not all that favorable anyway. And who might these guys face in the field with their scythes, forks, and billhooks? Probably the peasant levies and lowly foot-soldiers in the ranks of the other side, who wore little or nothing in the way of real armor ...

So true Philip, so true. As so described and illustrated, for one, by Jorge Tavares, in his work GUERREIROS MEDIEVAIS PORTUGUESES (Peonagem).